The octopus felt heartily relieved when he was finally set free, but he was so shy
that he didn’t dare talk to the fish and make friends with him. He simply thanked
the fish, and quickly swam off. Later, the octopus spent the whole night
thinking that he had wasted a great opportunity to make friends with that
very kind little fish.
A couple of days later the octopus was resting between some rocks, when he
noticed that everyone around was hurriedly swimming past. He looked into the
distance and saw an enormous fish coming over to feed in that area. The octopus
quickly hid; then, peeping an eye out from his hiding place, he saw that the
huge fish was chasing the kind little fish who had untied him. That little fish really
needed urgent help, but the big fish was so dangerous-looking that no one
dared to go near. The octopus, remembering how the little fish had helped him,
felt that he had to do whatever he could to come to his aid.
Without hesitating, the octopus shot out from the rocks, like a ray. He put himself
right in the path of the giant fish, and before the fish could do anything about it,
the octopus had shot out the biggest jet of ink of his life. He grabbed the little fish,
and swam off back to hide in the rocks. Everything happened so fast that the
big fish had no time to react. However, he soon recovered from the surprise. Off
he went to the rocks, looking for the octopus and the little fish. Now he really
wanted to gobble them down!
Soon, though, he began feeling a terrible itch; first in his gills, and then in his fins,
and then all over his body. It turned out that this giant fish had a very artistic
nature, he adored colours; and the octopus’s dark ink had given him a terrible
allergy!!
So the big fish swam away, irritated all over.
As soon as he was gone, all the fish who had been hiding came and
congratulated the octopus for being so brave. Then the little fish told them
all how he had helped the octopus a few days earlier, but he had never
known anyone be so grateful that they would end up doing something so
dangerous. Hearing this, the other fish discovered how nice the shy octopus
was, and everyone around was keen to be the friend of such a brave and
honourable octopus.